After defeating the Oakland Athletics in the American League Wild-Card game on October 3rd, 2018, the New York Yankees set to face off with the Boston Red Sox. The winner of the American League East division, the Red Sox blew away baseball this year with 108 wins. After years of being the underdog, the Red Sox are clearly the favorite in this years American League Division Series.

But the Yankees are a very strong team. After going 100-62 on the regular season, they would be division winners anywhere else in baseball. They have Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton, two of the premier sluggers in baseball. The rest of their lineup isn't bad, either. Their pitching staff has improved greatly with the addition of J.A. Happ, as well.

The Red Sox are an absolute juggernaut led by sluggers Mookie Betts and J.D. Martinez. Like the Yankees, they're a strong overall team. While they may have performed better than the Yankees in the regular season, they are actually rather evenly matched with the Yankees. The major advantage that the Red Sox have is ace Chris Sale and they have a bit more depth in the rotation thanks to their late-season pick-up of Nathan Eovaldi.

All in all, it's a playoff series that could easily go five games. With the Red Sox having Chris Sale, I'd take the over on the Red Sox winning in five. But this is a series that could go either way.

Who do you think will win the 2018 ALDS between the Red Sox and Yankees?

Becoming the starting shortstop for the New York Yankees does a lot for your reputation. Considering that the Yankees only gave up pitcher Shane Greene (who imploded in Detroit) for the services of shortstop Didi Gregorius, this is one of the better trades made during last offseason. While Gregorius was below average with the bat (91 OPS+) he built on his already above-average defensive tools. His defense made him a well above-average starter for the Yankees, compiling 3.3 WAR (Wins Above Replacement).

While obviously Gregorius is no Derek Jeter, he's proven that he can hold down the future Hall-of-Famer's former position. This realization has made Didi Gregorius's 2015 baseball cards a rather valuable commodity. Joining the most valuable and most recognizable baseball team in the world certainly helps his cards' collect-ability, but becoming an above average starter is good for anyone. There are so few copies of his cards available. If you're a Yankee fan, he's a must have for your baseball card collection. If you're not, he's still a solid addition to your collection and definitely one to make sure is in any 2015 Yankees team set.

The New York Yankees are enjoying a good season in 2015. As of this writing, they're currently in first place in the American League East. As team sets tend to be one of the most popular items for casual baseball card collectors, it's not a surprise that the 2015 Topps Yankees Team Set is a top seller The set includes 17 exclusive cards.

Masahiro Tanaka

Jacoby Ellsbury

Brett Gardner,

Dellin Betances

Carlos Beltran

Stephen Drew

Brian McCann

Garrett Jones

Michael Pineda

Jose Pirela (RC)

Mark Teixeira

Bryan Mitchell

CC Sabathia

Nathan Eovaldi

Alex Rodriguez

Didi Gregorius

Chase Headley

Jose Pirela's rookie card and Bryan Mitchell's rookie card are two of the more important pieces of this team set. Pirela had a very successful cameo in 2014 but hasn't done much at all in his stint so far in 2015. He's shown plenty of offensive potential in the minors, however, so there's still hope for him.

Mitchell has done well in very limited action, with a 2..66 ERA in 20 1/3 innings so far in his career. He's enjoyed decent success at AAA, as well. It's possible he could become a full-time starter for the Yankees in the near future.

Masahiro Tanaka has enjoyed plenty of success with the Yankees. Therefore, Tanaka's All-Star Rookie card, while not a true Rookie Card, is still worth a couple of dollars. There's tons of stars in this set, too: Ellsbury, Gardner, Beltran, McCann, Teixeria, Sabathia, and A-Rod. If you're a Yankee fan, and this ends up being a team to remember, it's going to be well worth the $10-11 that you'll typically spend on one of these sets.

With Ichiro Suzuki playing his final Major League game on March 21, 2019 in Japan, it seems to be the opinion of many that the Japanese outfielder is a no-doubt Baseball Hall of Famer. The credentials are there from a traditional statistics standpoint: 3089 hits and a career .311 batting average as of the end of the 2018 season. He has 487 steals over 14 seasons. If you include his stats from Japan, that's 1278 more hits over 7-plus seasons, a .353 batting average, and 199 more steals!

He certainly has the counting stats, that's for certain. Ichiro has never walked much in the MLB, but in Japan he actually posted very strong walk rates. He was also intentionally walked a lot, at least 13 times in his final 6 seasons in Japan. He was far more of a power threat In Japan than he was in the MLB.

Despite the fact that his Nippon League stats may not technically count towards his Hall of Fame candidacy, they should be observed. Ichiro has been playing professional baseball since he was 18 years old, albeit not becoming a starter until 20. He played at his final 2 games in 2019 at 45! To be fair, though, Ichiro hasn't been a star-caliber player since 2010. His 2011 was awful, with a .645 OPS. His defense wasn't all that elite that year, either, although his defense has been an asset since joining the Yankees in 2012. He enjoyed 6 and 8 DRS marks in 2012 and 2013, and was still positive at 1 DRS in 2014. He rebounded with 6 DRS in 2015 and 2016. In 2017 he regressed to -1 and in 2018 he fell further to -2. Still, even into his forties, he was a plus in right field for a very long time.

In his career, Ichiro has a 102 DRS in right field. That's pretty amazing. It's possible had he spent more of his career in center field (that the Mariners always had occupied by someone else), he would've saved even more runs and been even more valuable. That being said, he's been worth 59.4 WAR to Baseball-Reference. Imagine if he'd played more games in center field how his high batting averages and spectacular defense would've affected those totals!

Ichiro is a Hall-of-Fame caliber player. If he'd played for some better Seattle teams, or had played more center field, his overall value would've been higher. His years in Japan of being one of the greatest players in their league cannot be dismissed, either. Even after some mediocre years with the Marlins, it was nice to see him return to the Mariners for a last hurrah. Plus, he's a classy guy and it's near impossible not to like him.

The Washington Nationals decided to give up on outfield prospect Eury Perez by putting him up on waivers following their acquisition of light-hitting shortstop Pedro Florimon from the Twins. The Nationals felt they needed the infield depth and were willing to let Perez be taken. The Yankees were happy to oblige. I don’t like this move at all for the Nationals, who are getting a shortstop whose bat is atrocious and his defense, while okay, does not make up for the lack of offense.

This deal looks good for the Yankees, however. New York is getting a young outfielder with great speed. He’s batted over .300 in each of the past 3 minor league seasons. He also has plenty of speed, steailng 63 bases across 3 seasons in Triple-A. His walk rate has never been good and his power never really developed. While the Yankees expect to bring back their full starting outfielder of Brett Gardner, Jacoby Ellsbury, and Carlos Beltran next season, Perez looks like a decent fourth outfielder option with speed. He’ll probably spell Beltran in a good number of games next year and be a valuable pinch runner.

So far in the Major Leagues, Perez has only had 13 at-bats spread out across 22 games over two seasons. Now being 24 years old, the Nationals decided he was expendable. Perhaps he was. But essentially trading Pedro Florimon for Eury Perez doesn’t make any sense to me. In any case, the Yankees lose nothing here, especially considering that defensively Perez is supposed to be very good. The Yankees did have to let go Josh Outman, but that’s a minor loss considering the upside of Perez. Good, solid move by the Yankees; it seems they’ve been doing very well in picking up these guys that other organizations have given up on.

Perez will probably get into a few games for the Yankees in the final few games of 2014. There’s certainly no harm in seeing what he can do.

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